When we were commissioned to look at our bookshelves and find a book to pull off and promote, I knew exactly which one I would blow the dust off and first. The book A Severe Mercy, by Sheldon Vanauken was now in my hand and I couldn’t help noticed that my heart was beating a little faster as I started to flip through the pages reminiscing of the first time I read the book.Â
           It is a book that encompasses every aspect of the true, good and beautiful. Vanauken composes lines that sing away like music in the depths of the readers hearts. He writes of a journey of love, passion, desire, and truth. Why is the story so good? He touches the human heart with every page in the book. The story told is true, but even more than that it is real. If even the story being read does not relate to the story of the reader, it will relate to the desire of the reader to live this story. Â
           Vanauken (Van) writes about his relationship between him and his wife Jean (Davy) and how their love not only leads them into greater union with each other, but ultimately to Christianity. Van and Davy were skeptics of Christianity; in fact they did not see any reason why a person would be Christian. Christians were boring and rigid. And if Christianity bore boring, rigid people then there was no reasonable explanation for them to be Christian.
           Life for Van and Davy was about adventure, passion, and love. Van and Davy were living an authentically Christian life without knowing it. They were living Christian principles in what they came to call their “pagan love†days. It was their excitement for truth, goodness, and beauty that brought them to knees before our Lord Jesus when they accepted to live their dream and study at Oxford.Â
           It was the conversations they had with their new Christian friends at Oxford that led Van and Davy to become friends with CS Lewis. They would stay all night speaking with their friends only to become more enlightened to read another book or have another conversation to encounter truth, beauty, and goodness. It was in this way that they came to meet the person of Truth, Beauty, and Goodness in Jesus Christ.Â
           What a person will find when they read Vanauken’s book is that Christianity is about a life, not a one time prayer or a one time experience. It will be full of joy and full of sorrow. A Christian is meant to live a passionate life, but not a life led by the passions. It is a life full of desire, but not led from desire. Christianity makes sense to Vanauken, even though it hurts sometimes.Â
           There are surprises along the way as the reader dives into this adventure of love. This book will change the reader’s life…it changed mine. My heart is still racing. I am glad I blew off the dust. I think I might read this one again.    Â
2 responses so far ↓
1 Kelly // Jan 31, 2007 at 5:11 am
I’ll second Nathan’s recommendation on this one. I know a couple who read it together when they were engaged and it really helped them communicate about their own relationship more. It is also ideal for C.S. Lewis fans like myself–his letters, included in the text, reveal a bit more of his personality than his more discursive and fiction works do. Finally, the writer does tend to be the flowery/poet type–I know that turns some people off, but it’s a short book and I would encourage you to get past that and read it anyways. The author humbly relates a beautiful and edifying conversion story that simultaneously spurs the reader to desire a deeper, personal relationship with others and with He Who IS Love.
2 Naomi // Feb 21, 2007 at 9:34 am
I stumbled upon this blog site, and am delighted to share in this forum for “catholic culture” to be born. I too, loved and was changed by A Severe Mercy. It was the wedding favor at a friend of a friend’s wedding. The couple loved it so much that they wanted to share it. My friend, in turn, convinced our whole volunteer community to read it, which sparked many graced conversations about life and love, truth, goodness, and beauty. Read it. Discuss it with friends. It starts slow, but is definitely worth the effort.
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